How to Interleave 2 sided Documents

[gtr]

I have a two-sided document of some 40 pages. I scan it with an
auto-feed, turn it over and scan it again. How can I merge the two
documents interleaved so that they are in the right order?

[Jim Gibson]

Try Preview. See Preview Help for details.

--
Jim Gibson

[gtr]

The closest thing I can find is "Combine PDF's" wherein one each page
of one pdf document into the intended location of the other document.
Is that what you're referring to?

While good in a pinch, that makes for some significant labor if one has
to do 7 or 8 of these documents, as one does.

[henry]

Select all your scans, select open with Preview, they should be in
order in the side panel, (if not visibile, select show thumbnails),
then save as PDF

[gtr]

I have two documents, each is comprised of 40 pages; one has the
odd-numbered pages, the other has the even-nmber pages. How do I
interleave them?

[ErikRS]

To understand you correctly... - Your documents are scanned like this -
1-3-5-7 etc. and 2-4-6-8 etc., - and you want to make a single document
with page numberings 1-2-3-4-5-6-7...?

Which file format are you using - .pdf, .rtf, .doc etc.?

If your scanned files are in PDF format, you'll need to use Adobe
Acrobat to merge the scans. - Preview cannot merge PDF files. - Have
just tried it with some PDF documents...

If your documents are scanned as "text" files (OCR) you can use nearly
any word processor - MSWord, LibreOffice, OpenOffice, NisusWriter
Express / Pro etc.. Open the document with 1-3-5 numbering and in either
'File' or 'Edit' menus you'll find 'Merge' and 'Merge with'. Select
document with 2-4-6 numbering and mark both 'Even' and 'Odd'. This
should merge the documents in the right pagination order.

NOTE. The pages must of course be numbered inline and not just in the
file name.

HTH
Cheers, Erik Richard

--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Erik Richard Sørensen <mac-d...@MOVEstofanet.dk>
NisusWriter - The Future In Multilingual Text Processing - www.nisus.com
Openoffice.org - The Modern Productivity Solution - www.openoffice.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Your Name]

<snip>

Preview can merge documents. You can simply select the pages in one
document, copy them, and then paste them into the other document.

The problem here is that the pages need to be 'interleaved', so that
would require either doing each even numbered page (for example)
manually, one at a time, into the odd number page document (after
making a backup copy) ... OR copy-pasting the whole even number
document into the odd numbered document, and then manually re-sorting
the page order.

It would be the same in full Adobe Acrobat since there's no way to
merge the two doucments and have the pages interleave ... other than
perhaps an additional (probably expensive) plug-in.

[Your Name]

Assuming both PDFs have the pages in their correct numerical order,
then probably the easiest way is to use the Automator, which comes with
the macOS for free and already has a "Combine PDF Pages" function
included. This short YouTube video shows how to do it:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_9ukpLYl3E>

That should take less than five minutes to set-up and perform. Easy
peasy, lemon squeezy. :-)

[gtr]

On 2018-06-21 01:33:22 +0000, ErikRS said:

>

> gtr wrote:
>> On 2018-06-20 22:07:14 +0000, henry said:
>>> On 2018-06-20 21:54:23 +0000, gtr said:
>>>> On 2018-06-20 21:42:22 +0000, Jim Gibson said:
>>>>> In article <pgeh05$ek7$1...@news.albasani.net>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>>>>>> I have a two-sided document of some 40 pages. I scan it with an
>>>>>> auto-feed, turn it over and scan it again. How can I merge the two
>>>>>> documents interleaved so that they are in the right order?
>>>>>
>>>>> Try Preview. See Preview Help for details.
>>>>
>>>> The closest thing I can find is "Combine PDF's" wherein one each page
>>>> of one pdf document into the intended location of the other document.
>>>> Is that what you're referring to?
>>>>
>>>> While good in a pinch, that makes for some significant labor if one
>>>> has to do 7 or 8 of these documents, as one does.
>>>
>>> Select all your scans, select open with Preview, they should be in
>>> order in the side panel, (if not visibile, select show thumbnails),
>>> then save as PDF
>>
>> I have two documents, each is comprised of 40 pages; one has the
>> odd-numbered pages, the other has the even-nmber pages. How do I
>> interleave them?
>
> To understand you correctly... - Your documents are scanned like this -
> 1-3-5-7 etc. and 2-4-6-8 etc., - and you want to make a single document
> with page numberings 1-2-3-4-5-6-7...?

Correct.

> Which file format are you using - .pdf, .rtf, .doc etc.?

They are in .tiff format but I can convert them to pdf easily enough.

> If your scanned files are in PDF format, you'll need to use Adobe
> Acrobat to merge the scans. - Preview cannot merge PDF files. - Have
> just tried it with some PDF documents...

That's cool. I can merge PDF files with preview, I just can't
*interleave* them automatically, only manually.

> If your documents are scanned as "text" files (OCR) you can use nearly
> any word processor - MSWord, LibreOffice, OpenOffice, NisusWriter
> Express / Pro etc..

I have "etc.".

> Open the document with 1-3-5 numbering and in either 'File' or 'Edit'
> menus you'll find 'Merge' and 'Merge with'. Select document with 2-4-6
> numbering and mark both 'Even' and 'Odd'. This should merge the
> documents in the right pagination order.
>
> NOTE. The pages must of course be numbered inline and not just in the
> file name.

I'm not sure what "inline" would mean.

[gtr]

Excellent, thanks for the input. I'll give it a shot.

[CanuckMacUser]

There's an app in the Mac App Store that I found called PDF Scanner
that lets you scan one side of your documents with the document feeder
and then the other side and then interleaves them automatically with a
"Fake Duplex" feature. If you could convert your scans to PDF format,
add the even numbered pages onto the end of the odd number pages, and
save the file you should be able to just load the file into PDF Scanner
and run the Fake Duplex feature. Or it might just be easier to re-scan
to document again with PDF Scanner and forget about all of the
converting of file formats.

I forget how much exactly it was to purchase but PDF Scanner was around
the $10 mark and I use it for all of my scanning. It has OCR included
and is actively maintained.

[gtr]

Thanks for the info.

[ErikRS]

That was exactly how I did it, but Preview would only save the original
document. - OK, it might be because I use older versions from OS X
10.6.x and 10.7.x.

> It would be the same in full Adobe Acrobat since there's no way to merge
> the two doucments and have the pages interleave ... other than perhaps
> an additional (probably expensive) plug-in.

Hm, I can do it in the Acrobat Pro included with the CS5 package.
Haven't bought any extra plug-ins...

[ErikRS]

This means that the pagination must be in either the header or footer in
the originally scanned files. - It might have been better to write
'internal in the documents and not just in the file name'...

[ErikRS]

gtr wrote:
> On 2018-06-21 01:33:22 +0000, ErikRS said:
>> Which file format are you using - .pdf, .rtf, .doc etc.?
>
> They are in .tiff format but I can convert them to pdf easily enough.

Hm, since they are in a graphics format = .tiff, it might be possible to
use Torsten Lemkes 'GraphicConverter'. I recall from older versions that
GC had this possibility. Can't verify it since I don't have GC on this
computer.

[gtr]

I use GC all the time but know of no way to use it for interleaving two
documents. If the automator solution proves problematic I might
investigate.

[nospam]

In article <pghgg2$n3v$1...@news.albasani.net>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> I use GC all the time but know of no way to use it for interleaving two
> documents. If the automator solution proves problematic I might
> investigate.

there are several websites that will interleave scanned documents, if
you don't mind uploading it somewhere.

[gtr]

You mean like for a fee? Can you give me a hint on where these might be?

[nospam]

In article <pgkahv$s9o$1...@news.albasani.net>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> >> I use GC all the time but know of no way to use it for interleaving two
> >> documents. If the automator solution proves problematic I might
> >> investigate.
> >
> > there are several websites that will interleave scanned documents, if
> > you don't mind uploading it somewhere.
>
> You mean like for a fee? Can you give me a hint on where these might be?

some are free, such as this:
<https://www.sejda.com/alternate-mix-pdf>
<https://www.pdfmerge.com>

automator solution:
<https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7363128>

other solutions here:
<https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/53295/how-to-merge-2-pdf-files-
with-interleaving-pages-order>

if you need to do this more than occasionally, consider getting a
scanner that supports two-sided scanning.

[gtr]

Thanks again.

[Paul Sture]

On 2018-06-23, nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>
> if you need to do this more than occasionally, consider getting a
> scanner that supports two-sided scanning.

I can recommend the Fujitsu ScanSnap. I have the ScanSnap S1300i.
It's duplex so your two scans are only one scan for me, plus the
resultuing PDFs come out already ordered correctly.

<http://www.fujitsu.com/uk/products/computing/peripheral/scanners/scansnap/index.html>

I'd go for the larger iX500 if I had the budget, for the extra capacity
it offers.

Yes, I've seen people moan about the price of these versus all in one
printer solutions, but you get what you pay for.

--
"A successful [software] tool is one that was used to do something
undreamed of by its author." -- S. C. Johnson

[Lewis]

In message <57t91f-...@news2.chingola.ch> Paul Sture <nos...@sture.ch> wrote:
> On 2018-06-23, nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>
>> if you need to do this more than occasionally, consider getting a
>> scanner that supports two-sided scanning.

> I can recommend the Fujitsu ScanSnap. I have the ScanSnap S1300i.
> It's duplex so your two scans are only one scan for me, plus the
> resultuing PDFs come out already ordered correctly.

> <http://www.fujitsu.com/uk/products/computing/peripheral/scanners/scansnap/index.html>

> I'd go for the larger iX500 if I had the budget, for the extra capacity
> it offers.

I had one of these, and I recommend it highly.

> Yes, I've seen people moan about the price of these versus all in one
> printer solutions, but you get what you pay for.

For what you get, it's totally worth it.


--
SOURCERERS MAKE THEIR OWN DESTINY. THEY TOUCH THE EARTH LIGHTLY.

[gtr]

On 2018-07-08 17:11:33 +0000, Paul Sture said:

> On 2018-06-23, nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>
>> if you need to do this more than occasionally, consider getting a
>> scanner that supports two-sided scanning.
>
> I can recommend the Fujitsu ScanSnap. I have the ScanSnap S1300i.
> It's duplex so your two scans are only one scan for me, plus the
> resultuing PDFs come out already ordered correctly.
>
> <http://www.fujitsu.com/uk/products/computing/peripheral/scanners/scansnap/index.html>
>
>
> I'd go for the larger iX500 if I had the budget, for the extra capacity
> it offers.
>
> Yes, I've seen people moan about the price of these versus all in one
> printer solutions, but you get what you pay for.

I just spent $600 getting new cartridges for my Ricoh
printer/scanner/copier. I won't be buying any more scanners.

[Lewis]

Spending 600 of cartridges for a printer is a very silly thing to do,
and you should not have done it.


--
And I was grounded while you filled the skies I was dumbfounded by
truth; you cut through lies

[gtr]

You know nothing about my printer or my printing needs, so your
assessment is wholly without value.

[Paul Sture]

Ah, that takes us into the personal preferences. I prefer separates
myself (an extension, I suppose, of my preferences when buying hifi
back in the 70s/80s).

[Your Name]

The original printer-scanners weren't much good at doing either job,
but they have become much much better of the years.

It's almost impossible to buy a separate scanner in high street shops
here in New Zealand these days. They often need to be ordered or bought
online, and there aren't that many companies who still make them.

[ErikRS]

Lewis wrote:
> Spending 600 of cartridges for a printer is a very silly thing to do,
> and you should not have done it.

It totally depends on what you use your printer to... Prices on
cartridges for my Brother HL-9055CDN are just as high. - Yes, you can
buy cheaper 3.-party cartridges, but if you use such a printer to print
photos, it's better to use original cartridges.

[Your Name]

On 2018-07-11 02:01:35 +0000, ErikRS said:
> Lewis wrote:
>> Spending 600 of cartridges for a printer is a very silly thing to do,
>> and you should not have done it.
>
> It totally depends on what you use your printer to... Prices on
> cartridges for my Brother HL-9055CDN are just as high. - Yes, you can
> buy cheaper 3.-party cartridges, but if you use such a printer to print
> photos, it's better to use original cartridges.
>
> Cheers, Erik Richard

Cartridges for colour laser printers are expensive and could easily be
US$600 or more in total. Cartridges for inkjet printers on the other
hand should never be US$600.

Then again, maybe they meant US$600 for *3D* printer cartridges. ;-)

[Lewis]

Is it a $10,000 printer? No? Then spending $600 on cartridges fir it was
very silly.


--
Sometimes the gods have no taste at all. They allow sunrises and sunsets
in ridiculous pink and blue hues that any professional artist would
dismiss as the work of some enthusiastic amateur who'd never looked at a
real sunset. This was one of those sunrises. It was the kind of sunrise
a man looks at and says, 'No real sunrise could paint the sky Surgical
Appliance Pink.' Nevertheless, it was beautiful. --The Thief of Time

[Lewis]

In message <pi3odv$f4g$1...@solani.org> ErikRS <mac-...@is.invalid> wrote:

> Lewis wrote:
>> Spending 600 of cartridges for a printer is a very silly thing to do,
>> and you should not have done it.

> It totally depends on what you use your printer to... Prices on
> cartridges for my Brother HL-9055CDN are just as high. - Yes, you can
> buy cheaper 3.-party cartridges, but if you use such a printer to print
> photos, it's better to use original cartridges.

Better for the manufacturer, yes.

--
Vader means father in German.
Oh, you know German. Now I know why you don't like fun things.

[gtr]

On 2018-07-11 10:10:20 +0000, Lewis said:

> In message <pi2phm$auc$1...@news.albasani.net> gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>> On 2018-07-10 16:36:57 +0000, Lewis said:
>
>>> In message <phuo79$cb8$1...@news.albasani.net> gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>>>> On 2018-07-08 17:11:33 +0000, Paul Sture said:
>>>
>>>>> On 2018-06-23, nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> if you need to do this more than occasionally, consider getting a
>>>>>> scanner that supports two-sided scanning.
>>>>>
>>>>> I can recommend the Fujitsu ScanSnap. I have the ScanSnap S1300i.
>>>>> It's duplex so your two scans are only one scan for me, plus the
>>>>> resultuing PDFs come out already ordered correctly.
>>>>>
>>>>> <http://www.fujitsu.com/uk/products/computing/peripheral/scanners/scansnap/index.html>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> I'd go for the larger iX500 if I had the budget, for the extra capacity
>>>>> it offers.
>>>>>
>>>>> Yes, I've seen people moan about the price of these versus all in one
>>>>> printer solutions, but you get what you pay for.
>>>
>>>> I just spent $600 getting new cartridges for my Ricoh
>>>> printer/scanner/copier. I won't be buying any more scanners.
>>>
>>> Spending 600 of cartridges for a printer is a very silly thing to do,
>>> and you should not have done it.
>
>> You know nothing about my printer or my printing needs, so your
>> assessment is wholly without value.
>
> Is it a $10,000 printer? No? Then spending $600 on cartridges fir it was
> very silly.

When replacing them I shopped around for other printers to see what the
equivalent costs of their cartridges were. $10-30 difference with the
added bonus of having to buy a new printer to use them, and discarding
mine. $10k printers not withstanding, your personal judgements of what
other people should or shouldn't do, without knowing anything about
their use or need, is the *definition* presumptuous, and vastly more
inane that "silly".

Generally I find your aid and input of significant value. I'm surprised
at the vacuous nature of your idle speculation on this one.

[gtr]

On 2018-07-11 10:10:58 +0000, Lewis said:

> In message <pi3odv$f4g$1...@solani.org> ErikRS <mac-...@is.invalid> wrote:
>
>> Lewis wrote:
>>> Spending 600 of cartridges for a printer is a very silly thing to do,
>>> and you should not have done it.
>
>> It totally depends on what you use your printer to... Prices on
>> cartridges for my Brother HL-9055CDN are just as high. - Yes, you can
>> buy cheaper 3.-party cartridges, but if you use such a printer to print
>> photos, it's better to use original cartridges.
>
> Better for the manufacturer, yes.

Which color laser do you use, and how much do high capacity cartridges
cost for it?

[Lewis]

You could have gotten new cartridges for probably a quarter of what you
paid, perhaps less.

> Generally I find your aid and input of significant value. I'm surprised
> at the vacuous nature of your idle speculation on this one.

$600 on toner is silly, that's all there is to it. The printer companies
mark toner (and ink) up to fantastic margins (like in the range of 95%
or higher).

The most expensive toner for Ricoh I could find on amazon was about $450
for a set of four, but compatible sets are available for $150. (C430
prefix)

Ricoh's site will not tell you how much they charge for toner without
signing up for spam and sales calls, so I can't check their price, but I
bet it's considerably higher than Amazon.


--
I'm not old, I'm chronologically challenged.

[Lewis]

It's a brother, but I forget the specific model.

Ah, there it is, MFC9130CW. A 5 pack of toner (2 black, one of
everything else) is $70 or I could pay Brother $250 for 4 carts (one
each of CMYK).

Granted, that is just a office printer and I have no idea how it does
on photos, so I am not comparing that toner cost to your toner cost, but
the ratio is going to be 20-25% replacement cost for compatible carts
over paying the OEM for their official carts.

--
"The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him
absolutely no good." ~Samuel Johnson

[ErikRS]

Lewis wrote:
> In message <pi5jc4$tbv$2...@news.albasani.net> gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>> On 2018-07-11 10:10:58 +0000, Lewis said:
>>> Better for the manufacturer, yes.
>>
>> Which color laser do you use, and how much do high capacity cartridges
>> cost for it?
>
> It's a brother, but I forget the specific model.
>
> Ah, there it is, MFC9130CW. A 5 pack of toner (2 black, one of
> everything else) is $70 or I could pay Brother $250 for 4 carts (one
> each of CMYK).

Here prices on orig. cartridges are even higher - round $145 per color.
It is possible to buy origianl refurbished cartridges to apprx. 1/3 of
this and 3.-party OEM to near same prices as you mention.

> Granted, that is just a office printer and I have no idea how it does
> on photos, so I am not comparing that toner cost to your toner cost, but
> the ratio is going to be 20-25% replacement cost for compatible carts
> over paying the OEM for their official carts.

The MFC9130CW is near the same as my DCP-9055CDN so it should be rather
good for photo prints, but do remember to use the correct paper for
color laser photos.

My experience says that use of glossy or high-glossy paper isnot good.
Do use either silk-matted or full-matted laser photo paper.

[Your Name]

On 2018-07-13 00:03:14 +0000, ErikRS said:

>
> Lewis wrote:
>> In message <pi5jc4$tbv$2...@news.albasani.net> gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>>> On 2018-07-11 10:10:58 +0000, Lewis said:
>>>> Better for the manufacturer, yes.
>>>
>>> Which color laser do you use, and how much do high capacity cartridges
>>> cost for it?
>>
>> It's a brother, but I forget the specific model.
>>
>> Ah, there it is, MFC9130CW. A 5 pack of toner (2 black, one of
>> everything else) is $70 or I could pay Brother $250 for 4 carts (one
>> each of CMYK).
>
> Here prices on orig. cartridges are even higher - round $145 per color.
> It is possible to buy origianl refurbished cartridges to apprx. 1/3 of
> this and 3.-party OEM to near same prices as you mention.

I would never touch refilled laser toner cartridges. We had no end of
issues with them, although that was a few years ago now. I'm also not a
fan of refilled inkjet cartridges either.

Third-party cartridges can be good, but there are some really cheap
ones that are a nightmare.

>> Granted, that is just a office printer and I have no idea how it does
>> on photos, so I am not comparing that toner cost to your toner cost, but
>> the ratio is going to be 20-25% replacement cost for compatible carts
>> over paying the OEM for their official carts.
>
> The MFC9130CW is near the same as my DCP-9055CDN so it should be rather
> good for photo prints, but do remember to use the correct paper for
> color laser photos.
>
> My experience says that use of glossy or high-glossy paper isnot good.
> Do use either silk-matted or full-matted laser photo paper.
>
> Cheers, Erik Richard

The glossy papers sold in shops marked as "Photo Paper" is usually
meant for inkjet printers.

[ErikRS]

Your Name wrote:
> On 2018-07-13 00:03:14 +0000, ErikRS said:
>> Here prices on orig. cartridges are even higher - round $145 per
>> color. It is possible to buy origianl refurbished cartridges to apprx.
>> 1/3 of this and 3.-party OEM to near same prices as you mention.
>
> I would never touch refilled laser toner cartridges. We had no end of
> issues with them, although that was a few years ago now. I'm also not a
> fan of refilled inkjet cartridges either.

When I wrote 'refubished' I should have written 'factory refurbished'.
This isn't the same as 'refilled'.

From what I've read 'refurbished' means that these empty cartridges
have been cleaned and checked for mechanically faulties, problems with
the control chip or any kind of wear and tear. These refurbished
cartridges are also only used 2-3 times after the first product.

Where just 'refilled' are cartridges - toner or ink - that only have
been filled up again.

> Third-party cartridges can be good, but there are some really cheap ones
> that are a nightmare.

Indeed! You can't manufacutre a toner cartridge, fill it with powder and
sell it for just $5-10 and be sure that it'll work properly. Same with
store-refilled ink cartridges.

On the other hand, - if you buy ink yourself and use the original ink
cartridges and refill them yourself, you can make more proper work. But
only make such a refill 2-3 times.

>> My experience says that use of glossy or high-glossy paper isnot good.
>> Do use either silk-matted or full-matted laser photo paper.
>

> The glossy papers sold in shops marked as "Photo Paper" is usually meant
> for inkjet printers.

DO NEVER USE photopaper meant for an inkjeg printer in any laser. This
will damage the mechanically parts of the printer when the paper is
being warmed up!!!

For a color laser printer you must use special paper for such a printer
- labelled "for color laser printer". Normally photopaper for color
lasers aren't in stock in a normal PC store, but have to be ordered from
a specialist.

I have these types with my DCP-9055CDN. The stars refer to quality
experience. Manufacutrer of the paper I'm using are Avery, Canon and HP
in grades from 135 to 200 grams per sqm..
- High-Glossy *
- Glossy *
- Silk-Matted ***
- Matted ****
- Fully-Matted *****

The problems with the glossy color laser photo paper are that the toner
is being placed upon the surface and not integrate into the surface like
it is on an inkjet printer.

Also dark colors will dominate the surface structure. - OK, on some kind
of print-outs it can give a very special effect, but for a normal photo
- fx. a protrait - this will spoil the printed photography.

[Your Name]

On 2018-07-13 10:34:50 +0000, ErikRS said:

>
> Your Name wrote:
>> On 2018-07-13 00:03:14 +0000, ErikRS said:
>>> Here prices on orig. cartridges are even higher - round $145 per
>>> color. It is possible to buy origianl refurbished cartridges to apprx.
>>> 1/3 of this and 3.-party OEM to near same prices as you mention.
>>
>> I would never touch refilled laser toner cartridges. We had no end of
>> issues with them, although that was a few years ago now. I'm also not a
>> fan of refilled inkjet cartridges either.
>
> When I wrote 'refubished' I should have written 'factory refurbished'.
> This isn't the same as 'refilled'.
>
> From what I've read 'refurbished' means that these empty cartridges
> have been cleaned and checked for mechanically faulties, problems with
> the control chip or any kind of wear and tear. These refurbished
> cartridges are also only used 2-3 times after the first product.
>
> Where just 'refilled' are cartridges - toner or ink - that only have
> been filled up again.

Technically both have been refilled, and we used to have issues with
both types. Only proper brand new cartridges didn't show the problems
of faded printing ... but as I said, that was a few years ago, so
'refurbished' cartridges may well be much better now.

>> Third-party cartridges can be good, but there are some really cheap ones
>> that are a nightmare.
>
> Indeed! You can't manufacutre a toner cartridge, fill it with powder
> and sell it for just $5-10 and be sure that it'll work properly. Same
> with store-refilled ink cartridges.
>
> On the other hand, - if you buy ink yourself and use the original ink
> cartridges and refill them yourself, you can make more proper work. But
> only make such a refill 2-3 times.

Depends on the inkjet printer too. Some models have the printhead built
into the cartridge, while other don't. Refilling the printhead type
'too many' times is probably just asking for trouble.

Of course there's now the new Epson ink tank printers with large tanks
on the side of the printer which are more easily refilled. I haven't
used one of thoswe, so can't comment on how well or not that system
works. A barely used printer in the 'wrong' climate could easily be
hopeless as the ink dries out within the system's plumbing.